‘The Professional Company’ Evaluation

Mother Clap’s Molly House was a completely different kind of show to anything I had
experienced within my time as a performer. The role I had was something that was
completely out of my comfort zone and so I was excited to begin working on the
performance and further developing myself as a professional as well as performer.

I believe that as a company we were able to put on a really strong performance that
had convincing characters and was entertaining for an audience to watch. Our
ambition was to create a show that was entertaining but also educational, giving the
audience an insight into what life was like for someone who was homosexual in the
18th century and also showing aspects of the ‘family you have found’ aspect within
the show. As well as this the play had scenes in which the cast and staging would
flip to the early 2000s and this showed a contrast into what life is like today for
someone who is homosexual. We wanted the audience to understand that for people
in the 18th century who were homosexual life was not easy; they found great comfort
in finding someone who appreciated them for who they were and finding a non
biological ‘family’ full of people just like them and for them to really understand the
relationship between all of the characters. I strongly believe that we were able to
show these intentions very well and the audience understood what we were trying to
portray. Everyone on stage was able to bounce off of one another really well and this
helped us to show the relationship between the characters nicely and also really
helped to add to the entertainment factor. Creating our own music worked really well:
We used it to set a scene so the audience was able to gain that little bit of further
insight into what was going to happen in the scene after the song took place.

I believe my individual performance was overall a success and I was able to show
the contrast between my two characters really well which was something I needed to
work on. Gabriel Lawrence, my 18th century character was much more masculine
and dominant than my 2000s character Edward. Lawrence was much more tunnel
visoned and didn’t understand what was so good about homosexuality and was
disgusted when he saw it happen. However that was all an act as he quite often liked
to get away from the countryside and his wife so that he could come to the city and
find men to sleep with. Lawrence said that the only reason he slept with men was
because “Women’s needy and whores need paying” and I think this line sums up his
character. He seemed to be someone who was quite closeted and didn’t want
anyone to think he was unmasculine. I think I was able to show this intention to the
audience and they understood my character. On the contrary Edward was quite the
opposite. Edward was an extremely open homosexual man and came to this party
for no other reason than to film as much action as he could and get involved with as
much as he can. Out of him and his partner Phil, he was the more dominant one but
nowhere near as dominant as Lawrence. Edward was extremely full on and this led
to a lot of entertaining scenes and lines with this character, not to mention his
harness he wore all through the night. I believe I was able to show good contrast
between the two characters and was able to entertain the audience as much as I
intended to and create two enjoyable, but different characters.

Patrick Delaney, a member of the audience said:

“I thought overall the play was really good, I think they used the performance space
very effectively throughout the piece and had the perfect balance of comedy and
seriousness. I think the only thing they could work on is maybe slow it down at times,
sometimes some of the lines were lost as they were rushed but the comedic timing
was always on point. Also everyone just needs to make sure to maintain volume at
all times because sometimes it was verging on the quiet side. But I thought it was
really good, really strong individual performances from everyone and not much to
work on”
The point Patrick made about the pace of some of the scenes was very true, as I
know for myself and also for other people that this was something we could have
worked on. I feel some lines could have had a lot more intention behind them and
much more comedy behind them but because of the speed at which they were said it
took away that intention.

Frank Fowles said:

“Convincing characters were conveyed however in some of the lines the character
was lost due to either the contents of the line or trying to remember the line. In most
characters a sense of childlike energy was there which made the performance more
believable. When switching between the two time periods there was a clear
difference between the character although they had somewhat the same intentions.
The cast played off of each other really well and this caused the scenes to flow and
not feel rushed”.
Again, I agree with Frank that some lines definitely did lose their intention and this
was something that not just myself but all cast members could have worked on. I’m
glad Frank could see a clear distinction between the two scenes as this was
something as a company we found to have needed a lot of work.

I think for me personally something I would have definitely worked on more had I had
more rehearsal time is to involve myself more and to create more interesting chord
patterns within the songs. I was only part of three or four songs and I felt this had
something to do with myself taking longer to find the correct chords for a song as I
don’t understand music theory as well as other people in the group. In addition, the
guitar was something that had a lot of potential to play a bigger part in songs and to
create a nice ambience within the music. I also think I should have worked on my
diction a lot more as sometimes the audience lost some of my lines due to me
rushing them. Constantly going over my lines and scenes would help me to control
my diction a lot more in the future.

I believe this performance has really helped with my confidence on stage and that
was mainly because of my costumes. I think if I can go on stage in bigger
productions, as I did in this show, I would be able to wear anything when on stage. I
also found learning my lines as quickly as I did really helped me to spend a lot of
time focussing on my characters’ intentions and therefore creating much more
entertaining scenes. I feel I am now ready to take on bigger roles as a performer and
I know I would take on these challenges with a lot of confidence and belief in myself
that I could put on a good show.